Originally posted by mrstabbyI mean trade but dont send aid.
When you say leave them be, does this mean no trade whatsoever, or completely shut off the borders?
"Sorting out" an evil dictator is rarely directed at solving the underlying problem, as that "evil dictator" tends to be someone who won't let you get your hands on the valuable metal/gemstones any more. A nice dictator (say Mobutu in Zaire) will let you get your hands on their natural wealth, as long as you line their pockets in the process.
Originally posted by Brother EdwinHow about no aid from government-"government", but allow charitable aid which involves intermediate technologies etc.
I mean trade but dont send aid.
Who should have access to Africa's resources such as metals?
Should we trade products that we have subsidised to the point that we are pricing them out of their own market? (i.e. a controlled, not free market)
Originally posted by mrstabbyYes thats what I ment.
How about no aid from government-"government", but allow charitable aid which involves intermediate technologies etc.
Who should have access to Africa's resources such as metals?
Should we trade products that we have subsidised to the point that we are pricing them out of their own market? (i.e. a controlled, not free market)
If individual people want to donate money its up to them. But the government should worry about its own problems.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,363663,00.html
"For God's Sake, Please Stop the Aid!"
The Kenyan economics expert James Shikwati, 35, says that aid to Africa does more harm than good. The avid proponent of globalization spoke with SPIEGEL about the disastrous effects of Western development policy in Africa, corrupt rulers, and the tendency to overstate the AIDS problem.
SPIEGEL:
Mr. Shikwati, the G8 summit at Gleneagles is about to beef up the development aid for Africa...
Shikwati: ... for God's sake, please just stop.
SPIEGEL: Stop? The industrialized nations of the West want to eliminate hunger and poverty.
Shikwati: Such intentions have been damaging our continent for the past 40 years. If the industrial nations really want to help the Africans, they should finally terminate this awful aid. The countries that have collected the most development aid are also the ones that are in the worst shape. Despite the billions that have poured in to Africa, the continent remains poor.
SPIEGEL: Do you have an explanation for this paradox?
Shikwati: Huge bureaucracies are financed (with the aid money), corruption and complacency are promoted, Africans are taught to be beggars and not to be independent. In addition, development aid weakens the local markets everywhere and dampens the spirit of entrepreneurship that we so desperately need. As absurd as it may sound: Development aid is one of the reasons for Africa's problems. If the West were to cancel these payments, normal Africans wouldn't even notice. Only the functionaries would be hard hit. Which is why they maintain that the world would stop turning without this development aid.
SPIEGEL: Even in a country like Kenya, people are starving to death each year. Someone has got to help them.
Shikwati: But it has to be the Kenyans themselves who help these people. When there's a drought in a region of Kenya, our corrupt politicians reflexively cry out for more help. This call then reaches the United Nations World Food Program -- which is a massive agency of apparatchiks who are in the absurd situation of, on the one hand, being dedicated to the fight against hunger while, on the other hand, being faced with unemployment were hunger actually eliminated. It's only natural that they willingly accept the plea for more help. And it's not uncommon that they demand a little more money than the respective African government originally requested. They then forward that request to their headquarters, and before long, several thousands tons of corn are shipped to Africa ...
SPIEGEL: ... corn that predominantly comes from highly-subsidized European and American farmers ...
Shikwati: ... and at some point, this corn ends up in the harbor of Mombasa. A portion of the corn often goes directly into the hands of unsrupulous politicians who then pass it on to their own tribe to boost their next election campaign. Another portion of the shipment ends up on the black market where the corn is dumped at extremely low prices. Local farmers may as well put down their hoes right away; no one can compete with the UN's World Food Program. And because the farmers go under in the face of this pressure, Kenya would have no reserves to draw on if there actually were a famine next year. It's a simple but fatal cycle.
SPIEGEL: If the World Food Program didn't do anything, the people would starve.
Shikwati: I don't think so. In such a case, the Kenyans, for a change, would be forced to initiate trade relations with Uganda or Tanzania, and buy their food there. This type of trade is vital for Africa. It would force us to improve our own infrastructure, while making national borders -- drawn by the Europeans by the way -- more permeable. It would also force us to establish laws favoring market economy.
SPIEGEL: Would Africa actually be able to solve these problems on its own?
Shikwati: Of course. Hunger should not be a problem in most of the countries south of the Sahara. In addition, there are vast natural resources: oil, gold, diamonds. Africa is always only portrayed as a continent of suffering, but most figures are vastly exaggerated. In the industrial nations, there's a sense that Africa would go under without development aid. But believe me, Africa existed before you Europeans came along. And we didn't do all that poorly either.
SPIEGEL: But AIDS didn't exist at that time.
Shikwati: If one were to believe all the horrorifying reports, then all Kenyans should actually be dead by now. But now, tests are being carried out everywhere, and it turns out that the figures were vastly exaggerated. It's not three million Kenyans that are infected. All of the sudden, it's only about one million. Malaria is just as much of a problem, but people rarely talk about that.
SPIEGEL: And why's that?
Shikwati: AIDS is big business, maybe Africa's biggest business. There's nothing else that can generate as much aid money as shocking figures on AIDS. AIDS is a political disease here, and we should be very skeptical.
SPIEGEL: The Americans and Europeans have frozen funds previously pledged to Kenya. The country is too corrupt, they say.
Shikwati: I am afraid, though, that the money will still be transfered before long. After all, it has to go somewhere. Unfortunately, the Europeans' devastating urge to do good can no longer be countered with reason. It makes no sense whatsoever that directly after the new Kenyan government was elected -- a leadership change that ended the dictatorship of Daniel arap Mois -- the faucets were suddenly opened and streams of money poured into the country.
SPIEGEL: Such aid is usually earmarked for a specific objective, though.
Shikwati: That doesn't change anything. Millions of dollars earmarked for the fight against AIDS are still stashed away in Kenyan bank accounts and have not been spent. Our politicians were overwhelmed with money, and they try to siphon off as much as possible. The late tyrant of the Central African Republic, Jean Bedel Bokassa, cynically summed it up by saying: "The French government pays for everything in our country. We ask the French for money. We get it, and then we waste it."
SPIEGEL: In the West, there are many compassionate citizens wanting to help Africa. Each year, they donate money and pack their old clothes into collection bags ...
Shikwati: ... and they flood our markets with that stuff. We can buy these donated clothes cheaply at our so-called Mitumba markets. There are Germans who spend a few dollars to get used Bayern Munich or Werder Bremen jerseys, in other words, clothes that that some German kids sent to Africa for a good cause. After buying these jerseys, they auction them off at Ebay and send them back to Germany -- for three times the price. That's insanity ...
SPIEGEL: ... and hopefully an exception.
Shikwati: Why do we get these mountains of clothes? No one is freezing here. Instead, our tailors lose their livlihoods. They're in the same position as our farmers. No one in the low-wage world of Africa can be cost-efficient enough to keep pace with donated products. In 1997, 137,000 workers were employed in Nigeria's textile industry. By 2003, the figure had dropped to 57,000. The results are the same in all other areas where overwhelming helpfulness and fragile African markets collide.
SPIEGEL: Following World War II, Germany only managed to get back on its feet because the Americans poured money into the country through the Marshall Plan. Wouldn't that qualify as successful development aid?
Shikwati: In Germany's case, only the destroyed infrastructure had to be repaired. Despite the economic crisis of the Weimar Republic, Germany was a highly- industrialized country before the war. The damages created by the tsunami in Thailand can also be fixed with a little money and some reconstruction aid. Africa, however, must take the first steps into modernity on its own. There must be a change in mentality. We have to stop perceiving ourselves as beggars. These days, Africans only perceive themselves as victims. On the other hand, no one can really picture an African as a businessman. In order to change the current situation, it would be helpful if the aid organizations were to pull out.
SPIEGEL: If they did that, many jobs would be immediately lost ...
Shikwati: ... jobs that were created artificially in the first place and that distort reality. Jobs with foreign aid organizations are, of course, quite popular, and they can be very selective in choosing the best people. When an aid organization needs a driver, dozens apply for the job. And because it's unacceptable that the aid worker's chauffeur only speaks his own tribal language, an applicant is needed who also speaks English fluently -- and, ideally, one who is also well mannered. So you end up with some African biochemist driving an aid worker around, distributing European food, and forcing local farmers out of their jobs. That's just crazy!
SPIEGEL: The German government takes pride in precisely monitoring the recipients of its funds.
Shikwati: And what's the result? A disaster. The German government threw money right at Rwanda's president Paul Kagame. This is a man who has the deaths of a million people on his conscience -- people that his army killed in the neighboring country of Congo.
SPIEGEL: What are the Germans supposed to do?
Shikwati: If they really want to fight poverty, they should completely halt development aid and give Africa the opportunity to ensure its own survival. Currently, Africa is like a child that immediately cries for its babysitter when something goes wrong. Africa should stand on its own two feet.
Give them humanitarian aid to prevent their starvation and try to build up their society, and they complain.
But don't give them aid, and watch the fireworks, they'll scream bloody murder.
It's a lose-lose situation. Nothing will make them happy and nothing the western nations do will ever be right or suit them. It's the same story in every country they end up moving to. Their failure is our fault.
Best thing to do is leave them to their own devices so they don't have anybody to blame but themselves.
Originally posted by Sam The ShamGood point. While you're leaving them alone. Leave their p u ck ing resources alone as well and stop meddling in their internal politics and setting up sides against each other because you thought you had a mandate to lump a bunch of strangers together in one country because you arrived late on the colonial grab scene and decided to cobble together a region of disparate peoples into one unholy mess just because you could.
Give them humanitarian aid to prevent their starvation and try to build up their society, and they complain.
But don't give them aid, and watch the fireworks, they'll scream bloody murder.
It's a lose-lose situation. Nothing will make them happy and nothing the western nations do will ever be right or suit them. It's the same story in every count ...[text shortened]... o do is leave them to their own devices so they don't have anybody to blame but themselves.
By all means leave Africa the p u k alone and take your acculturation policies and your subjugation to western style market economies and dependence on staple crops to pay back the massive loans you deemed it necessary for them to have.
Please be Africa's guest and p uk off! And take all your (s) hit with you. Your tailings dams that have been poisoning rivers your acid rain from your petroleum cartels who don't give a rats about any environmental policies because their are no legislative authorities there with enough muscle to make them not wantonly burn off their excess like great big funeral pyres into the night sky.
Just go. Don't worry about it for another second. Don't even try and apologize or even try and fix it just take up your crap and go!
Originally posted by kmax87I rest my case. Your arguments just proved everything I said. No aid is right, no helping them build up an advanced society and helping them develop the natural resources that they have ignored and let lay fallow is right, and nothing the big bad evil "colonialists" have ever done to take africa out of the stone age is right. Even after they've left and the locals take over and let everything go to hell, it's still not their fault. Witness the mess that happened with Rhodesia/Zimbabwe and the new South Africa.
Good point. While you're leaving them alone. Leave their p u ck ing resources alone as well and stop meddling in their internal politics and setting up sides against each other because you thought you had a mandate to lump a bunch of strangers together in one country because you arrived late on the colonial grab scene and decided to cobble together a region o second. Don't even try and apologize or even try and fix it just take up your crap and go!
Truly, you have a dizzying intellect kmax.
Originally posted by kmax87Kmax, the problem with Africa is not the Americans, its the Africans. And nobody can fix that problem. Not even the Africans.
Good point. While you're leaving them alone. Leave their p u ck ing resources alone as well and stop meddling in their internal politics and setting up sides against each other because you thought you had a mandate to lump a bunch of strangers together in one country because you arrived late on the colonial grab scene and decided to cobble together a region o ...[text shortened]... second. Don't even try and apologize or even try and fix it just take up your crap and go!
Originally posted by Rajk999Its all very well to say they have problems but the west has always held it as her exclusive right to determine who should be 'helped' regardless of the wishes of the 'person' 'receiving' the 'assistance'.
Kmax, the problem with Africa is not the Americans, its the Africans. And nobody can fix that problem. Not even the Africans.
For instance, if I were a cable guy and I knew you were living in a bloc of apartments where every one only listened to the radio and because I thought that was a crying shame and so backward, I took it upon myself to bash your doors down and complete a full installation with all the channels doing it in such a way that no-one in the bloc would ever have to pay for the installation or the channel content. Not only do I upset every one's apartment with my forthright invasion of their space, I am also very obnoxious while doing the installations, leaving dirt everywhere, knocking out holes in walls to get to things and generally making a great big mess, which I feel is not my responsibility to clean up because hey everyones getting free cable so quit complaining already.
To further complicate matters I tell the people who were used to the economics of free radio, that after a while the content providers would want to start billing them and before long I am quite proud of my achievements in introducing these poor people to the wonders of cable TV
When someone tries to explain to me that my apparent largesse is seen very negatively by the people living in the bloc, I rant and rave and curse the residents for being so ungrateful etc................................
Is it that hard to acknowledge the point I am making?
Originally posted by kmax87Yes, I understand the point.
Its all very well to say they have problems but the west has always held it as her exclusive right to determine who should be 'helped' regardless of the wishes of the 'person' 'receiving' the 'assistance'.
For instance, if I were a cable guy and I knew you were living in a bloc of apartments where every one only listened to the radio and because I thought ...[text shortened]... ..............................
Is it that hard to acknowledge the point I am making?
You are the smart cable guy that wants to sell cable subscriptions to a bunch of morons in my apt block. I see absolutely nothing wrong with what you do. I will consider myself and my neighbours very stupid for allowing you to suceed in doing something that is detrimental to us.
Do you understand my point? ITS MY FAULT IF YOU OUTSMART ME !
The US Govt and the US corporations have their own agenda and most people on this planet are smart enough to figure that out and use the US to their own advantage and even create a symbiotic relationship :
- Europe was able to do it over and over again in the 1900s
- Japan was able to use the US technology after WWII to their benefit and subequently beat them at their own game
- China is now doing that
- India is now developing into one of the fastest growing tech centers in the world.
- Israel did it and much of the Islamic states are doing it and benefiting from US Tech and finance.
- even humble Trinidad where I am from was able to utilize the US funds and technology in the energy sector.
The point is that availability of the US funds, technology and know how is the best thing that happend to world in the 1900s, and most countries know how to use it to their advantage.
What is wrong with Africa ? I will give you three guesses but you only going to need one.